The Day Maintenance Went Crazy
by ChandaK562
Summary: On his way to close down a bakery, Mister Garibaldi and Talia are trapped in the lift, but what ought to be a dream come true for him is fast becoming a nightmare
1. Chapter 1

"Okay, do you want to tell me again what happened that requires the chief of security in here?" Michael Garibaldi asked Doctor Franklin as he looked around the medlab. There were battered people everywhere, all wearing the uniform of maintenance. Had there been a riot he had somehow missed?

"It was the cake. It seems Mister Harper in maintenance was having a birthday, and his co-workers chose to get him a cake." Stephen closed his eyes for a moment, trying to fight off the beginnings of a pounding headache. "Unfortunately, there was an error at the bakery that supplied the cake. Have you ever heard of it? The nearest I can figure is that it's located somewhere in brown sector and….."

"They got a cake from there?" He knew what place they were talking about, alright, and he honestly wasn't sure how the bakery was still in business. "So what happened? Did they riot when they got an obscenity on their cake? Everyone gets that on their cake. I don't think whoever does the decorating knows how to spell in any known language."

"No, the problem is that they somehow got a cake that was apparently meant for a pak'ma'ra. I don't want to know how that one happened, and how they managed to cut and actually eat it without noticing there was a problem. There's an ingredient that the pak'ma'ra use, the best explanation would be that it would be like a super-inhanced sweeter if it was for a human. Unfortunately when humans ingest it. hallucinations are the result."

"So maintenance….."

"The entire first shift ended up out of their minds on cake and somehow no one noticed until second shift came in. When they tried to get everyone down here, I don't know what they thought was happening, but they went crazy. So now I have the entire first shift in here out of their minds, the second shift in here with injuries, and most of the third shift who I don't want to know how they ended up involved…."

"So we have no maintenance?"

"We have three members of maintenance, who were unfortunately, or fortunately as it turns out, called to deal with a complaint in Londo's quarters."

"Okay, so how does this call for security?"

"I've got everyone in here, and hopefully they'll be fine by tomorrow. What I need for you to do is to get to that bakery and shut them down before there's another little mistake."

"Fine." Was closing down a bakery really a job for security? But he wasn't going to argue with it. Michael was surprised that someone hadn't tried to order that place shut down long before now. He turned and headed for the nearest lift. Better get this over with fast. With maintenance out, the complaints would start piling up fast.

The lift didn't seem to be co-operating with him, though, heading down for the intersection with green sector instead of up towards the level he needed to get to brown. Not again. Normally he would be thrilled to take a little ride with Miss Winters, but not today, not when his mind was focused on that bakery, and some of their more interesting and disastrous pastries.

"Miss Winters." He said as the lift door opened and the telepath stepped inside. Don't think. He closed his eyes and tried to order his brain to stop working, and to stop recalling the cake that was supposed to be an old Earth style rocket ship but had ended up looking more like….. No, no, no! Don't think! Don't recall the twisted donuts or the….. Maybe if he beat his head against the back of the lift it would get those thoughts to stop, hopefully before Talia decided to slap a restraining order on him for sexual harassment. Could telepaths seek restraining orders based on out of control thoughts, like the cake that someone had ordered in the shape of a sliced pear for some reason, but ended up looking more like a…

The elbow in his stomach abruptly cut off the thought of the cake.

"Mister Garibaldi, I have had a long day of meetings." Talia said as she glared at him. She had actually gotten used to how loudly he tended to broadcast thoughts, but today was just too much and the things he was thinking about… "My head feels like it's about to explode, and honestly, I'm tempted to stop off at Commander Ivanova's and ask to shoot me. I do not need to hear you thinking about…."

"I wasn't! I promise, I wasn't thinking about anything bad! Well, okay, I was but it isn't what you think. There's this bakery that I've got to go shut down. I swear I was just thinking about their cakes, and their donuts and…." He paled as he recalled the croissants the bakery had offered once. "Talia, could you hit me again fast before I remember something else?"

Talia started to reply before the lift suddenly jolted, and she tumbled into Mister Garibaldi's arms. "What just happened?" She demanded as she looked up at him.

"I think I just found a problem maintenance caused when they were high as a kite." The lift definitely wasn't moving. Was the universe out to get him? Trapped in a lift with Miss Winters. He had had fantasies about that, but nowhere in his fantasies were there thoughts of obscene baked goods running through his head that were sure to make her think he was insane. He helped her back to her feet and then activated his link. "Garibaldi to Security. I've got a problem in one of the lifts."

"Shouldn't that make a noise?" Talia asked. Normally she would have half suspected Mister Garibaldi of setting this up. She was still trying to work out how he always ended up in the lift she was in, but the worry on his face was clear, even if his thoughts weren't enough to convince her he wasn't up to something. If his thoughts just wouldn't be so loud….

"Yeah, it should." He stared at the link before activating it again. "Garibaldi to Security!" No, nothing. "Garibaldi to C and C!" No C and C either. "Garibaldi to Ivanova?"

"Mister Garibaldi?"

"I'm sorry. I'm really sorry about this. We're having a few little problems with maintenance today. Garibaldi to Franklin." Still nothing. "Garibaldi to Sheridan. Garibaldi to….." What was his name now? "Garibaldi to Corwin?" Nothing. Absolutely nothing. Communications was deader than a doornail.

"Mister Garibaldi?" Talia called again and then winced and closed her eyes as a pain washed over her head. "What is going on?"

"Little maintenance problem. Little maintenance problem." Why in the world hadn't Stephen warned him that maintenance might have done a little monkeying around with things before second shift found them high as a kite. Link was down, lift was down, panel to signal for help inside the lift was down too, he realized as he punched it without response.

"Little maintenance problem?" Talia said as she looked at him.

"Yeah, first shift got into a cake made with some pak'ma'ra ingredient that made them hallucinate. Apparently it also made them go nuts and fix a few things that didn't need fixing."

"So we're trapped?"

"It looks like it. Listen, I'm sure someone's going to come looking and get us out of here sooner or later. It's just a matter of whether or not any of the other lifts are out too, and if anyone that ranks more important than us has managed to get themselves stuck." It would be just his luck that Londo and G'Kar would be trapped in a lift together. They would be lucky to be rescued before next week if that happened. The time spent cleaning up the blood alone….

"Do you suppose they are?" Talia said in a halfway hopeful tone as she picked up his thoughts. "I don't mind waiting if that might be the case."

"It might be a long wait."

"I spent four hours in a meeting with the two of them. If there's a chance they're in a lift killing each other now, I'll happily wait." Well, maybe not happily. With her head pounding, she wasn't going to be happy until she saw a soft pillow and hopefully some painkillers, but she could make do if it meant she would never have to attend a meeting with the two ambassadors again.

"Well, hopefully we won't have to wait too long. Surely someone will notice that communications are down before too long." He took the gray jacket part of his uniform off before spreading it on the ground. "If you want to rest your feet though?"

After a moment, Talia nodded her head in thanks, and sank to the floor, tucking her feet under her, and smoothing her skirt into place. With a soft sigh, she leaned back against the wall and closed her eyes. Maybe if she could just rest slightly, her head would stop pounding.

Michael watched her, a smile on his face. Maybe being stuck in the lift for awhile wouldn't be so bad, but that didn't mean he shouldn't at least make some attempt to get them free. "Garibaldi to anyone?" He called softly as he tried to activate the link again. What in the world had maintenance done, and was taking down communications and the lifts the full extent of the problem?


	2. Chapter 2

It was quiet. So quiet that Susan Ivanova was almost tempted to say it was too quiet. No ships showing up unexpectedly throwing docking into chaos, no fights anywhere on the station, not even an ambassador calling to drive her insane. Yes, it was much too quiet, and frankly, she was more than a bit suspicious of what the silence might mean. The ambassadors were never this quiet. At least one or more likely ten of them would have called by this point in her shift, demanding this or that, but there hadn't been a peep for hours, since she had heard that Londo had called about a bug on the loose in his quarters. Much too quiet.

But maybe she was worried for nothing. Maybe the lot of them had been stricken down with mass cases of laryngitis. John's voice had sounded a bit scratchy before his meeting with the ambassadors the day before. Maybe he had been coming down with something, and had infected them all. Of course, then he would probably put her on sick duty, running tissues and hot drinks to all of them, but still, blissful, blissful silence. Susan closed her eyes as she pictured it, silent ambassadors for days and days.

Something cold brushed her face, causing her eyes to fly open. What in the…. "Corwin, what is this?" She demanded as she glared at the bits of white falling in front of her face, not sure that she didn't need to run down to Medlab and get Stephen to check out her eyes. They were indoors, on a space station. How in the world could she be seeing snow?

"Snow." Corwin looked around, trying to see where it was coming from. "I think something might be wrong with the environmental controls." At least that looked like what was producing the snow that seemed to be coming down harder every minute.

"Snow." Just perfect. She would probably be the one who got laryngitis instead of the ambassadors. "Ivanova to maintenance." She called as she activated her link. "We have a problem in C & C with the environmental controls."

No beep, no voice responding. "Corwin?"

"Nothing here." He said after trying his link, and then the main communications system without response. "Commander?" Probably this wouldn't be a good time to ask her if he could run to his quarters to pick up the pair of mittens his sister sent him for some odd reason last Christmas.

"Does anyone in here have an active link?" Susan called, only to be greeted by a universal shake of heads. Communications were down? How long had communications been down? And what disasters had hit various parts of the station while communications were down? "Corwin, get down to maintenance, and get someone up here to fix communications." The snow would have to wait until they had the comm system fixed.

"Commander?" Corwin called a few minutes later, when he had tried and failed to summon a lift. "I think the lifts are down too. And I will take the stairs." He said as he caught sight of the expression on Susan's face.

Lifts were down. Communications were down. It was snowing. What else could go wrong? No, don't think that. She knew all too well the things that could go wrong. It would be her luck that G'kar and Londo were trapped in a lift together and maintenance would be spending the next week cleaning up the blood. "Do we have external communications?" She asked the officer who had taken Corwin's place. Wait, how would they know if they had external communications, with the lull in ships coming on. "Never mind. Just set up an automatic signal, on the off chance it's just internal communications that are down. Warn any incoming ships that we're experiencing minor technical problems, and there will be a delay with docking." That sounded diplomatic, and a lot better than what she would really like to say to anyone who might want to dock at the moment. How long was it going to take for Corwin to hike down the stairs and get maintenance anyway? She shivered, in spite of trying to resist and frowned down at the snow that was covering the floor of C & C. An inch. There was already an inch of the stuff. What in the world was going on here?

"Commander?" Corwin called when he finally returned nearly forty-five minutes later.

"Corwin, how nice of you to join us." Susan grumbled. The snow was up to mid-calf now, and would be up to her knees if she was any shorter. She was half-way tempted to send someone out to hunt down shovels, but where would they put the snow if they tried to clear a path? And where in the world was John? Surely he had some clue they had a problem by now.

"Sorry, Commander. It's crazy down there. I don't think a lot of the aliens have seen snow before or something, because…." Corwin shook his head, to get some of the snow from the Narn showball ambush he had wandered into off. Honestly, his hair was flat. He didn't know how they had mistaken him for a Centauri. "We've got a real problem. Maintenance…. I checked and their office was empty so I started asking and I'm not sure what happened. I was a little afraid to disturb Doctor Franklin asking for the details, but pretty much the entire maintenance department is down in the Medlab. I don't think they're going to be able to help us right now."

"What?" Maintenance was out sick? Things were definitely getting worse. She closed her eyes and forced herself to take a deep breath. No maintenance but…. "Corwin, go down to the docks, see if the guild has any members who have some clue about the communications systems and how to fix them." Communications had to be taken care of first, although the snow and stopping or at least containing it was fast becoming a priority too. Why in the world wasn't Mister Garibaldi doing something, and forcing the aliens into their quarters if they were acting as crazy as Corwin said? Not that she had time to worry about that at the moment. "You." she turned to another officer. "Go and see if you can find some shovels so we can at least move up here." If they had to, they could always blow the shoveled snow out of an airlock. "And someone find Captain Sheridan now!" Where in the world was everyone else?


	3. Chapter 3

Something was touching her face. Talia raised a hand, trying to bat it away so she could go back to sleep. Her headache had almost been gone and then something disturbed her, and it was back full force.

"Talia?" Garibaldi called her name and patted her cheek. He hadn't worried at first when it seemed like the lift was getting colder, but maybe he had waited a bit too long to try to wake the telepath. No, he thought as he looked down at the snow on the floor and rapidly falling from the top of the lift, he had definitely waited too long. "Talia, come on, I'm really sorry to ruin your nap, but you need to get up now, okay? Talia?"

"Mister Garibaldi?" Talia blinked her eyes open, and took in the situation, Garibaldi kneeling next to her on a floor covered with…. "Is that snow?"

"It's snow. Come on. It's coming down kind of hard. Being on the floor probably isn't such a good idea right now." Garibaldi said as he helped Talia to her feet even though she was still half asleep.

"We're indoors, on a space station. Why is it snowing?" Talia asked as Mike draped his jacket around her shoulders and secured it as best he could.

"I think our little maintenance problem just got worse." Snow, how in the world had they messed the station up so badly that it was snowing in the lifts? And was it snowing elsewhere on the station? He didn't want to think of the chaos that such an unexpected event would cause. Security was probably going crazy and here he was stuck in a lift and…. No, if he wasn't stuck in the lift, then Talia would have been trapped in there alone, and who knows how long it would have taken to find out she was missing, since she had been heading home? His being in the lift was a good thing, and if security couldn't manage without him through a little snowstorm while he figured a way out of here, he would fire the lot of them.

"Is communications still out?" Talia looked up, worry hitting her now and rapidly replacing the annoyance the headache was causing. That snow was coming down fast, and was almost ankle deep. Ankle deep snow, and shoes that were not meant for such weather. She would probably fall and break something.

"It's got to be the main communications system. Ivanova's probably pitching a fit." And if the main communications were out, that meant that rescuing the trapped security chief and station telepath were probably low priorities. Which meant that he better figure out something fast, before the snow got any deeper. "Okay, Talia, you just stay there and don't move, okay? I'm going to see what I can do about getting the lift doors open." If they could get the doors open, then hopefully they could get out, or at least shove the snow out. He tried to recall the lift movement, to work out where they might be in the station, but stopped when he realized he didn't have the vaguest idea, and with maintenance monkeying around, who knows if the lift movement was even functioning correctly. They could be anywhere along the shaft.

"Can you open the doors from the inside of the lift?" Talia asked as Garibaldi examined one of the panels.

"In theory you're not supposed to be able to. If there was a way to open the lifts from the inside, we'd have ambassadors pitching each other out every time we turned around. I've heard that the foolproofing might not be as foolproof as the designers said, though. Here's hoping that they made a mistake putting the stuff in." This would go easier if he had some sort of tool. Tool. The buckle on his belt might work. At least he hoped it worked. The snow coming down as hard as it was, in an enclosed space, if he didn't get them out of there or get the doors open, they were going to be in major trouble, He forced that thought away, and turned to smile what he hoped was a reassuring smile at Talia as he tugged at his belt. "Don't worry. I'll have us out of here in no time."

"Mister Garibaldi?" Talia shivered violently and had to grab the wall of the lift to keep from tumbling into the knee-high drift of snow on the floor as the movement made her shoes slip. He had the panel covering the lift controls open. That was a good sign, wasn't it? She tried to force away the thought that it had taken him enough time that over a foot of snow had fallen by the time he was done. How much more snow would come down before he could work out how to open the doors? If there was a way to open the doors. If there wasn't…. Talia closed her eyes and shivered again as she imagined the two of them, the snow slowly creeping up, until it buried them.

"It will be okay. Just a few minutes and I'll have this fixed, I promise." Garibaldi didn't bother with trying to offer a reassuring smile as he examined the panel interior. Okay, he had it open, but what was he supposed to do now? "Garibaldi to Ivanova!" He called as he activated his link again, although he really didn't expect a response.

"Wait!" Susan shouted at the dock worker who was halfway inside the equipment hosting the communications system. "Stay there! Don't move! Garibaldi, where are you? Things are crazy out here!"

"Where am I? I'm trapped in one of the lifts with Miss Winters, that's where I am, and I would appreciate someone coming to get the two of us out of here!"

"You're trapped in a lift." The lifts. She couldn't believe it, but this was the first she had heard about someone actually being trapped in a lift, which she considered a minor miracle with how things on the station had suddenly went crazy. The lifts. Garibaldi and Talia were in the lifts together. She didn't want to imagine the headache the telepath had to be getting, but…. Had she heard about any problems in the lifts besides the fact they weren't moving? And Talia, those shoes of hers, however nice they were, would be a disaster in the middle of a snowstorm. The lifts. She didn't see how it could be snowing in there. It might be cold, but Talia and Garibaldi could huddle together if they had to. Better than being out in the midst of this weather. "Stay there. I'm not sure how long it will be until we can get someone down there to get you. Corwin!" She shouted as Corwin came through with the shovel, pushing snow, and pushed a scoop right into the open panel, causing sparks and an angry shout from the dockworker, and abrupt silence from Garibaldi. "Just perfect!" But at least she knew that Talia and Mike were safe. That was one plus, anyway.

"Did she just tell us to stay here?" Talia asked.

"Ivanova!" Garibaldi shouted before realizing the link had cut out again.

"You know, I heard she pushed a telepath out a third story window once. I thought we were getting along much better, but maybe it was just a plot to lull me into a false sense of security." Talia murmured. Or maybe the cold was starting to get to her, but a plot to do in a telepath was suddenly sounding very plausible. "There aren't any windows here, and freezing would probably be a neater way to kill someone, I suppose. You wouldn't have to try to scrape anything up off the ground afterwards."

"She probably doesn't know that it's snowing in here." Although he was suddenly regretting stealing the last muffin at breakfast, and that false report he had sent to Susan, claiming there was an inventory scheduled for the garden, and the removal of unnecessary plants. It had been funny at the time, seeing her scurrying about, looking for a hiding place for her beloved coffee plant but now…. "Believe me, if there's anyone she might be trying to kill, it's me, not you."

"I've tried to be nice. Really, I have. I honestly thought it was starting to work." Talia murmured, as if she didn't hear him. "I thought that telepath she pushed had done something to deserve it. I thought…."

"Talia, Susan wouldn't try to kill the two of us. At least not like this, after I called her in the middle of C & C." He added after a moment's thought. "Too many people would know, and at least she would get a formal reprimand. I'm sure she thinks the lifts are okay. Cold, but I don't see how she could know they're filling up with snow. She's probably telling everyone to stay where they are. She can't be trying to kill everyone." Even though he wasn't sure how she would take it, he wrapped his arms around Talia for a moment.

"Mister Garibaldi?" Talia blinked, the sudden contact and feel of his thoughts causing her head, muddled from the headache and cold, to clear.

"Okay, Susan knows we're in here. Sooner or later she's going to find out about the snow, and she's going to come and get us out, but in the meantime…." He turned and looked at the open panel. "If I just had something a little smaller…."

"Would this work?" Talia unfastened her Corps pin and held it out.

"That would be perfect. Okay, just stay right there, and I swear I'll have this door open in just a minute."


End file.
